Review of Shaun Of The Dead

I really enjoyed watching Shaun of the Dead, a 2004 film. I felt the movie had been overly hyped during its release and never watched it until now. Sad thing about publicity campaigns is my imagination is rather vivid and I began to expect much more from what I'd heard about this film than what I actually saw. 


In spite of SOD's slow start - a couple's bickering over their dating discomfort - as  soon as the zombies began to appear the movie became much more fast paced and very fun to see.

One of my favorite scenes involved a "girlfriend" beating zombies back with her boyfriend's bloody lower stump after he'd been disemboweled and dismembered.


If the video, below, does not play, you may watch the 5-minute version of Shaun of The Dead here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWw9vE39IGc

Review of "Return Of The LIving Dead 3" LMAO

Return Of The Living Dead 3 ... Director: Gerry Lively. Fascinating flick presents self-mutilating and suicidal zombies! Parts of this movie were so compelling I'd rewind just to watch a particular scene over again, thanks mostly to excellent make-up and animation.

This has got to be one of my all-time favorite zombie movies (not kidding). In the beginning, the objective is for military and medical personnel to create bio weapons for the United States with human corpses. Curtis, the main teenage character, is in love with peer Julie. But what can he do when she starts eating brains? (I won't destroy the movie by sharing HOW she became a zombie.) Fortunately, Julie learns that self mutilation helps her not to feel quite so cannibalistic and she shoves every metal thing into her soft tissue except for maybe a fork and knife.

If you enjoy watching movie scenes where legs are shown kicking (while the camera scans away so you don't see ALL the zombie action) then this film is also for you.


Here's Snapshots Of Dialog:

• "It's your fault. Your brought me back. You should have just left me dead." (Julie to Curtis.)


• I just buried myself in this insane job and because of that, I haven't always been there when you needed me. . .We have a lot to talk about."


• "It proves that the living dead are not just animated flesh. It proves that they have an inner life."


• After watching really grotesque zombie behavior in a seemingly sterilized room, we hear "I need to know what the hell happened here." (like duh, dude. Weren't you just watching?) LOL


• Curtis: "So you really think I could do it?" (go to Seattle, play in a band, when Curtis has never had any musical training). Homeless man, aka "You can call me 'River Man": "Sure. Why not? Course. What do I know? You're talking, to a guy, who lives in the sewers!"


• "Next time you see someone who needs help, you just give 'em this Madis Gras coin and help em out. And you tell them to do the same. To help somebody else. Because as long as that coin is circulating, there's always somebody out there doing something good for somebody."


• "Strap that damn thing down before it wakes up again."
  


• "If people knew what they had inside them, and knew how to get it out, they'd be a lot more happy." Homeless "River Man."

Lessons From This Movie:

• Never get too hyper-focused on anything or you might get bit in the ankle by a newly made zombie. 

Embedding of the movie beginning (first part) was disabled ... you can watch it HERE

Review of "The Lost Boys" (1987 Vampire Flick)

Watching "The Lost Boys," a 1987 - Joel Schumacher film, was entertaining to say the least. A few highly intelligent Facebook friends had suggested that I watch it ... and to my light-hearted pleasure, I did!


In the beginning scenes, brothers Michael and Sam travel by car with their recently divorced mom, Lucy, to their new home in California. After that, it was difficult to decide what, exactly, was happening. A whirling vacuum motion kept sucking people into the air, as though strange abductions took place helicopter-style. Actors screamed as they followed car hoods and flying debris into oblivion. Later, however, the movie showed a beach scene where party-goers screamed as that same whirlwind-like disturbance swirled sand around them and then vampires suddenly appeared to sink fangs into their skulls.

What really made this movie worth watching, in my opinion, was all the humorous dialog.

EXAMPLES OF HUMOROUS QUOTES:

"Lucy? You're the only woman I know who didn't improve her situation by getting a divorce." Said Ganja-smoking hippy-grandpa (Lucy's father).

"Anything around here might pass for some aftershave?" ... "How bout some Windex Grandpa? ..."Yeah. That might work!"

Santa Carlo's become a haven for the un-dead. "Kill your brother. You'll feel better."

Very geeky boyfriend brings mom flowers. Her retort? "Boy. Someone around here has bad breath" (family's dog, a Husky suddenly appears)

Don't ever INVITE a vampire in, you silly boy! It renders you POWERLESS!

The movie also features a lot of slapstick humor, such as when a teen couple are presented in what may become a make-out scene, since they're sitting in back of a car at what seems to be a lookout point. She's laughing over a comic book. He's trying to kiss her. She smack's him alongside the head. Then the winds come.

Then, when the film focuses more on the vampires, things get a little creepy. A beautiful young teen is dominated by her loser-boyfriend and it makes the viewer wonder why her mom never taught her to "Say No To Thugs!"

Because this movie was filmed in the 1980's you'll see rotary dial phones, nerdy kids on stingray bicycles and ongoing arguments over which comic-book toting young boy can protect whom. When the geeky boys enter the vampire hotel it's an abandoned warehouse decorated with rotted linen curtains.

After, teen-age Michael, main character, drank from a fascinatingly hand-decorated wine-bottle that a ring-leader "lost boy" passed his way, stoner-like euphoria results and Michael realizes he just consumed vampire blood. Next? He's having serious anti-gravity issues.

OTHER VAMPIRE FACTS:

Instead of sleeping in coffins, these vampires hang from their bat cave upside down (like bats).

When a vampire is staked through the heart, one of two things can happen. Either guts and globs of goo shoot everywhere or the vampire looks like he's being electrocuted with sparks flying everywhere. (There are only male vampires featured in this film.)

One weapon the boys used against vampires involved filling squirtguns with a garlic "tea." With such monster soakers, they seemed successful at fending the vampires off until a couple more resourceful fang-bearers entered the house through the chimney - Santa Claus style.

STARS: Jason Patric, Corey Haim, Kiefer Sutherland, Jami Gertz, Corey Feldman, Dianne Wiest, Edward Herrmann, Alex Winter, Jamison Newlander, and Barnard Hughes

Guest Post By Author of "Jinn Nation" - Caroline Barnard Smith

Author Caroline Barnard Smith

Caroline Barnard-Smith has been writing stories since she was five. Having earned a bachelor’s in English Literature from the University of Portsmouth, she now lives in Devon, England with her husband and baby daughter. That's where she writes about ruthless vampires, lovelorn zombies and heinous blood cults!


Caroline's short stories have been published in numerous small press magazines, including Ballista, Hungur, Night to Dawn, and on the web at Dark Fire Fiction.


Caroline’s debut dark fantasy novel, Dunraven Road, was published by Immanion Press in June 2009. For various exciting reasons she’s since turned her hand to indie publishing.  Jinn Nation is her first full-length independently published novel. 


When she’s not writing, Caroline is busy running her handmade craft business, CazzCraft, selling both online and at craft fairs.



This (blog post and book excerpt) is the first time we meet Thad, a geeky, timid character from Jinn Nation who is nevertheless determined to become one of the jinn.  He thinks Christa might provide him with some jinn-related answers when she breezes into his book shop one afternoon, little knowing the terrifying power she possesses.

******

New York City
Thad hummed as he wiped the tattered duster along the shelves. Cleaning made him feel calm and accomplished. It also prevented his thoughts from straying to the duties he was committed to carrying out that night. Sometimes he could work for an entire ten minutes without thinking about it. Then the cold, dread fear would flash through his mind again and he would pause, duster in hand, and tremble. When the bell above the shop door jingled to announce the first customer of the afternoon, Thad turned towards the sound eagerly, a practiced smile on his face.

“Good afternoon, miss.”


The woman nodded politely but declined to reply. She looked round at the shelves of books, hands thrust down into the pockets of her jeans. She was pretty, Thad decided, in a pedestrian sort of way. She wasn’t his type at all. The woman was far too skinny, too fragile-looking, and the hair straggling in unkempt tufts to her shoulders only made her appear wild and strange. Still, Thad was used to seeing unusual customers pass through the doors of Gorski’s Esoteric Texts and Occult Supplies. Strangeness was an inherent part of the job.


“Can I help you with anything?” 


This time, the woman spoke. “No I’m fine, thanks. Just browsing.”


She smiled, making the corners of her eyes crease, and walked past Thad into the bowels of the shop. Thad tried to appear casual as he passed behind his desk and turned on the monitor hidden behind it. He didn’t like to spy on his customers but the very nature of a book shop, especially one with so many aisles of text for people to hide behind, made trust hard to come by. It was a lesson he had learnt through grim experience. He had once found a doped-up vagrant passed out at the back of the shop, laid out flat between ‘Power Animals and Totems’ and ‘African Tribal Magick’. The latter was an area Thad had to keep a particularly close eye on. He assumed the black and white photos of heavily breasted women in ceremonial dress had something to do with the loiterers he often had to remove from those shelves.


Thad watched the woman, small and grainy on the monitor, as she slowly walked the aisles, one hand running along the spines of the books beside her. When she stopped before a section entitled ‘Jinn – Legends and Mythcraft’, he swallowed thickly. It was a certain type of person who was interested in the dark legends of the jinn. He waited, his breathing becoming fast and irregular, wanting to be sure the woman was not simply bored or lost amongst the shelves. To his delight, she remained where she was, head bent at an angle as she read the names of the books. He ran a hand through his gently greying hair and followed in the direction she had taken, creeping up so silently behind her that when he spoke, she started with surprise.


“I don’t get much call for information on the jinn. Are you sure you wouldn’t rather see some books of love spells?”


The woman looked at him with distaste. “I didn’t come here for love spells. They don’t work, anyway. Those books only exist so that people like you can prise money from the lonely and the desperate.”


A strange headache started in the back of Thad’s brain. It buzzed and irritated like a trapped fly, momentarily robbing him of concentration. He nodded slowly, struggling for an answer. “I should have known you were no mere initiate to the world of the occult,” he finally said. “You have the look about you. A certain knowing in the eyes.”


The woman was staring at him, making him feel uneasy. “Why are you so fascinated by the jinn?” she said. “You’ve never even met one.”


“That’s true, but I would like to. I would like to meet one very much.” Thad felt as though some alien being had taken over his body. He could feel the floor beneath his feet, was aware of the breath entering and leaving his lungs and of the earthy, fresh smell of the many books surrounding him. He could feel these things, yet he seemed to have lost all control. He didn’t want to tell the woman about his fascination with the jinn. In his head he was silently screaming at himself even as the words passed his own lips; yet he was utterly powerless to prevent himself from speaking.


“It’s more than that,” the woman was saying. She paused, head cocked, wide green-grey eyes boring a path into the deepest parts of Thad’s soul. He thought he whimpered, but he wasn’t sure. After a few seconds, the woman smiled in triumph. “You want to be one,” she said. “You want to be turned jinn.” Her smile faded. “Why?”


Thad willed himself not to speak again, not to reveal his closest secrets to this petite yet terrifying stranger. He pressed his lips together and closed his eyes, sweat standing out along his receding hairline.


“Why?” the woman asked again.


White flashes danced before Thad’s eyes and his head began to swim. “Because anything has to be better than this,” he blurted. He felt as if the words were being forcefully torn from his throat. “Every day when I wake up I want to do something exciting. I want to have adventures. I want to travel and meet women and have experiences. But every day I put those thoughts out of my head, come downstairs and open the shop. I serve the customers, I sell them things. Every goddamn day is the same. I don’t know how much longer I can stand it.”


“So you think the jinn will offer you an adventure?” the woman said. “An experience?” Her voice had softened. “They’d probably just eat you.”


“So you do know about them.” Thad thought for a moment. “Are you one of them?”


His sudden sense of quiet awe at being in the presence of a jinn was squashed when the woman began to laugh. She lifted a hand to her mouth in an attempt to hide it.


“So what are you?” Thad was beginning to lose his temper. This was his shop, his property. What right did this strange woman have to barge in and cast some sort of truth spell on him?


“I’m not jinn,” the woman said. She studied Thad for several seconds before releasing him and turning away. “You don’t have the information I want. Your head is full of stories and fantasies.” She began making her way towards the door. “Stay away from the jinn,” she called over her shoulder. “They’re not nice people.”


Thad’s head didn’t clear until the bell over the door jingled again, signalling the woman’s departure. He lifted a hand to his chest to feel his heart beating so hard it threatened to splinter his rib cage. He had seen some spooky shit in his time as the proprietor of the shop, but nothing had ever shaken him up this badly. Thad walked back to his desk and collapsed on the chair behind it, content to spend the rest of the afternoon in quiet meditation. Strange people are par for the course, he told himself. This shop attracts all sorts, there’s nothing to be afraid of. He repeated these phrases many times, yet his quickened heart refused to calm down until he’d reached for the half-bottle of brandy hidden in a side drawer and slugged back two generous mouthfuls. 





Follow the Caroline's blog tour: /barnardsmith.wordpress.com/jinn-nation-blog-tour/

Vampegeddon - Lamest Of All Crippled Movies

Directed by Jeffrey Alan Miller. With Michael Alvarez, Richard Anderson, Josh Bingenheimer, Jenna Contreras and MORE, "Vampegeddon" is a "don't bother to see" film.

I tried watching this very low budget work: "Vampegeddon" and cannot believe I hung in there for a full five minutes. I never made it to the part where a Goth college girl, Melissa, is supposed to open an old book of spells to resurrected a heinous vampire. The animation was so horrid, with fake scenery and bad camera work, I began to feel as though not even the return of Jesus' could save viewers from the horrors of this movie. (It's so putrid it could gag a maggot).


The fighting scenes (I watched two) are done in awkward and choppy slow-motion and that's not because the camera slowed things down ... that's just the acting. It looks choppy and forced. Don't waste two minutes watching this flick. Trust me. I'm doing you a favor by saving you time so you can watch something more worthwhile.

Review of "Vampire Girl Vs. Frankenstein Girl" (2009) - DVD

Vampire Girl Vs. Frankenstein Girl (hilarious action, twisted comedy, sick-and-wrong but frolicsome gore-fest). Directed by Yoshihiro Nishimura and Naoyuki Tomomatsu.


HOW THE MOVIE BEGINS:
Monami looks like your typical girl-next door. She's cute, giggles a lot and seems utterly innocent in her Catholic school-girl type of high school uniform with white knee socks. Yet after she corners a most sought-after classmate named Mizushima, to give him a piece of chocolate, he soon learns the filling is not maraschino cherry as it first appeared but it's Monami's own coagulated blood. Unfortunately, he's already eaten it and he immediately becomes very sick with her vampire DNA.

Thus begins the amazing tale of a half-vampire, with all the twists and creative turns involved in hormone-driven teenagers attending high school together.

INTERESTING CHARACTERS IN THIS MOVIE:
1. A hunchbacked custodian who looks very much like Quasimodo (the Hunchback of Notre Dame). Yet his name is Egore, coincidental to the Frankestein fanatic that horror fans are all familiar with.

2. A spineless, thumb-sucking "mad scientist" and vice principal who makes "artwork" out of dismembering cadavers and reattaching foreign limbs in the most bizarre places for a "new" body. He also wears a shrunken human head in lieu of a corsage in his lapel.

3. A vampire whose predatory mouth turns ginormous and fang-filled, when ordinarily she looks like a typical cuddly teenager.

4. A team of girls who practice cutting their wrists in search of community attention and fame. Think of the wrist cutting contest as the horror film's alternative for a normal pie eating contest and you get the idea for what sort of community support launches such a bizarre athletic endeavor.

5. A very sexy but psychotic school nurse who gives Nurse Ratched (One Flew Over The Cookoo's Nest) a run for her status as the most evil nurse ever seen on film.

Beyond all the highly entertaining characters there's lots of blood spurting from decapitated bodies as though the cadavers were all part of a much larger bloody sprinkler system. Think: bloody showers EVERYWHERE! There's also repetitive maniacal laughter throughout.

Beyond all the hilarity, this film presents interesting special effects, such as a girl who continually evolves into a mechanical spider-type manifestation of the horrifying monster; the kind of evil creature that the most unsettling nightmares are made of.




I rate this film a definite worth seeing; especially since it's a free download with the most limited subscription to Netflix.